Thanks to everyone, this has generally been a great discussion so far. Some themes and topics have come out that deserve their own space. I’ll start with my favorite- the People’s Database.
I. This Should All Be Public and Easily Available
When we started the PALS Database in the Forest Service WO NEPA shop(part of the E-gov initiative)(probably the early 2000s), the acronym stood for Planning, Appeals and Litigation Database. Our intention was to build out the NEPA piece, as well as appeals (and objections) and litigation, and after testing and refinement, make it publicly available.
And far too often, our debates start from clashing assumptions instead of shared facts.
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And we need decisions rooted in shared, validated data rather than ideology or assumptions.
Perhaps if we are to figure out where we really disagree and what can be done about it, we should start with asking the Forest Service to provide us with validated, public data. So I went through the comments from yesterday and pulled the questions that could be answered with the People’s Database.
1. Sam said “I haven’t seen a whole lot of litigation against thinning projects in the Sierra Nevada. The few lawsuits (against thinning) in the courts over the decades have not been very successful.”
Database would include project, purpose and need, litigation, plaintiffs, dates filed, dates appealed, date settled,data project began, link to court documents, (probably other info of interest to legal folks.) Then we would know.
2. The Black Hills. I vaguely remember an amendment to the Forest Plan being required as part of a settlement agreement. So there must have been some litigation? Again, we would know from the People’s Database how many lawsuits had been brought on the Hills over time.
3. Dave said ” I would really like to see the stats of how many projects in the last year or two have been covered by Emergency Action Determination. I am going to guess that it is a majority. Maybe some lawsuits could be prevented if the Forest Service did a better job at resolving issues during the objection process.” We could easily see that if each project was entered and could be searched using that. Probably PALS has that and we could ask.
Denise said “EADs cover well over one million acres at this point maybe two million” but we don’t know. And is that the acres impacted by actions or project areas?
4. Brett said:
The paper from the Breakthrough Institute found a 28% loss rate for NEPA. This compares to Fleischman et al. (2020. US Forest Service implementation of the national environmental policy act: Fast, variable, rarely litigated, and declining. Journal of Forestry, 118(4), pp.403-418) which states that; “Of the 241 resolved cases (the others are still outstanding), the USFS won 67 percent, lost 21 percent, and settled 12 percent.” The problem with these numbers is they don’t account for the documents that are withdrawn before going to court. So, the real odds of the Forest Service losing a case is perhaps close to 50:50. And remember all ties go to the Forest Service (we get deference).
So I think the two studies probably differed by timeframes, definitions and maybe kinds of projects. We should be able to do our own analyses (IMHO) and also be able to link to settlements.
Also, Brett, when I read Science at the Bar, I didn’t think Jasanoff said that the courts are the place to resolve conflicts. I’ll have to go back and look. It seems like the political process is where ox-goring is generally decided.
II. Is it Fair to Say “the FS is trying to cut the public out by using CEs?”
I think of the HFRA CEs, for example. Congress established them because they weighed the pros and cons and came up with a tool for the FS to use. Should the Executive Branch say “sorry gals and fellas, we don’t want to use this because we don’t agree with your judgment.” That’s an interesting separation of powers question. Or are we blaming Congress for not caring about public comment? ESD’s were part of the IIJA, Vilsack had one map, the current Sec. another. Again, if Congress comes up with something specifically to help with a problem that it sees, the FS should not use that tool.. because…???
I do think the tenor of this discussion is different, because it tends to blame FS employees (incompetent timber-lovers) instead of Congress or any given Admin or party.
The whole wildfire/fuel treatment concern has changed the old Timber Wars discussion (at least in California, where wildfire is front and center). People and groups outside our “usual suspects” have been asking questions. And they raise some of the concerns I’ve had since TSW was initiated.. only they write better and have a larger and more diverse audience.
To combat wildfires before they happen, the U.S. Forest Service (USFS), county conservation boards, and other stakeholders implement fuels reduction projects that can reduce excess dry wood and shrubs, and clear smaller vegetation that allows fires to grow faster and reach into the canopy of forests. Fuels reduction approaches like mechanical thinning and prescribed burns have proven to be effective mitigation strategies to reduce the damage from wildfires on ecosystems and to help firefighters stop fires. Yet, a small but loud environmentalist minority opposes fuels reduction, instead claiming that California’s forests must be left untouched. They use outdated environmental laws like the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), Endangered Species Act, Federal Land Policy and Management Act, and National Forest Management Act in courts to delay, and sometimes cancel, projects that would mitigate the wildfires that destroy the ecosystems they claim to protect, and threaten tens of thousands of lives.
During the period that about a sixth of California’s forests were going up in flames, one single group was busy suing the USFS 24 times. That group, Conservation Congress, was responsible for just under two fifths of the USFS’s NEPA-related lawsuits that were decided in federal circuit or appeals courts in California from 2010 to 2024, and spent $2 million on those lawsuits and 5 more in other western States.
What’s most remarkable about Conservation Congress is not their ability to single-handedly hamstring dozens of USFS projects, but that they are, in fact, single-handed: the organization effectively is just one person: Denise Boggs of Great Falls, Montana.
A long-time forest activist and veteran of the California “timber wars,” Boggs has taken the USFS to the mat on countless occasions, often coming up the loser. But she is determined. Boggs believes that the USFS, in bed with logging companies, is using fuels reduction programs and other fire management to create “loopholes big enough to drive logging trucks through.” It is Bogg’s mission to close those loopholes and save the northern spotted owl.
But the problem here is not Boggs, per se. The problem lies in a system that allows a single person to make decisions that reverberate and impact millions of people and millions of acres of our natural resources and ecosystems. Boggs may seem like an outlier—few individuals might have as large an impact on forest permitting, or any other form of NEPA litigation—but the fact that U.S. environmental law can allow for such undemocratic processes and excesses is indicative of the system’s inability to rationally protect the environment.
The Tyranny of the Non-Profits
In fact, Conservation Congress is not an outlier. There are plenty of organizations that wield outsized, undemocratic influence over how the federal government can act. From 2010-2024, the Center for Biological Diversity (CBD)—an organization based in Tucson, Arizona with just over a $30 million budget and more than 100 staff members—and the Sierra Club—based in Oakland, California with a budget over $170 million and more than 700 staff members—were responsible for a quarter of all NEPA-related litigation decided in district and appellate courts. These groups are large and well-funded, able to spend millions of dollars litigating projects while simultaneously lobbying federal agencies in Washington, D.C.
When looking at forest management, specifically, groups like Conservation Congress—few employees, with smaller budgets, but with the capacity to delay or outright stop important projects—stand out. Alliance for the Wild Rockies—an organization with few employees and variable funding that sits well below half a million dollars per year—filed 84 suits against forest management projects from 2010 to 2024, or roughly 27% of all forest management NEPA cases in that period. Native Ecosystems Council—similarly small in staff and budget—filed another 53 suits. Collectively, these three organizations were responsible for just over half of all forest management suits during that period.
These are, by definition, special interest groups. The Center for Biological Diversity and the Sierra Club are national non-profits that advocate for and act on behalf of a specific ideological framework that places the abstract entity of “the environment” over all else. While the Sierra Club has a much longer history—the organization was founded in 1892 by legendary environmentalist and conservationist John Muir—the rest of these non-profits are relatively new projects. CBD was founded in the 1990s by a group of northern spotted owl biologists who sought to protect the species at all costs. Conservation Congress, Alliance for the Wild Rockies, and Native Ecosystems Council are all post-turn-of-the-21st-century organizations founded by activists who grew up—ideologically speaking—during the environmental protests of the late 20th century. With the exception of the Sierra Club, which has grown beyond just conservation and preservation, these groups are single-issue groups—protect endangered species, no matter their niche, or lack thereof, and ignore everything else.
Through NEPA litigation, these groups are able to wield outsized power, and curb federal projects—which often have support from local stakeholders—in the name of protecting toads, owls, and more. Their litigation delays, and, in some cases, forces agencies to cancel, projects that would have serious benefits, without even the semblance of a democratic process. The USFS, on the other hand, at least has democratic oversight from elected officials at the federal level. And the local groups working with the federal agency—like county conservation districts, municipal works programs, and more—are directed by elected officials put into office by local elections.
Who agreed to let Denise Boggs, Michael Garrity of Alliance for the Wild Rockies, and Sara Johnson of Native Ecosystems Council decide how our forests should be managed, what species are preserved over others, and what works or does not work when it comes to fire management?
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And are courtrooms the best place to determine best land management practices? In my experience, no. We have been discussing this question here since 2010..I think it’s interesting to note the difference between how Martin Nie framed the issue (regulatory enforcement, in his usual very well-written way) compared to others (who has the right to decide, and what is the best place to resolve controversies). I still don’t know why pilots to resolve issues via other conflict resolution approaches than litigation (e.g.,mediation, arbitration) have been removed from bills. Then there’s the gendered aspect of litigation, that I wrote about in 2019.
We disagree about projects. We disagree about practices on projects. We disagree about trade-offs. We can also disagree about the best practices for conflict resolution, it seems to me.
Huckleberry Flat campground BLM on St. Joe River. Steblina laid out and built this campground.
Check out Vladimir’s ideas.. some are novel (at least to me). much to discuss!
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The three major funding sources for Forest Service recreation programs has been appropriated dollars, collection of Recreation Fee Program and withholding of special fees related to the recreation program. There is a real need for new steady funding sources particularly for operations and maintenance dollars.
Except for a few very brief periods of time, the Forest Service recreation program has always been thought to be underfunded.
The proof of this was always the deferred maintenance backlog for recreation facilities. To a much lesser extent “overuse” and the inability to mitigate the impact of visitor use was also used to frame it as “underfunded recreation” in the Forest Service.
Historically, the recreation program was originally funded through special use permits. This funded the summer home program, when there was no money for campgrounds. The “fishing resorts” of the west when there was no money for boat launches. And of course, the western ski industry which to a great extent is dependent on Forest Service managed land.
Then, of course, there was the CCC program which built many recreation facilities on National Forests, but was a “employment program” with the built recreation facilities being “training” for folks. With the public land timber boom from the 1950’s through the 1970’s the Forest Service was able to use timber dollars to subsidize recreation opportunities.
The Forest Service Operation Outdoors in 1957, though not as successful as the Mission 66 program by the National Park Service, did push Forest Service into providing recreation opportunities.
Too Many Facilities Too Little Money.
Granted ,when developing a new program an agency will almost always overbuild the facilities for various reasons. The Forest Service took it to a entirely new level.
I worked for the National Park Service, BLM, and the Forest Service in recreation management. It has always struck me that the Forest Service has so many more recreation facilities than the other agencies for the acreage managed.
The Forest Service is probably underfunded, but it is also dramatically overbuilt in its recreation facilities. And its recreation facilities are poorly designed and incur high maintenance and operation costs.
The Forest Service has never successfully addressed the excess recreation facility issue. And it needs to focus on rebuilding and designing recreation facilities with low maintenance and operation costs.
The Okanogan-Wenatchee National Forest example.
I was the Recreation Program Manager for the Okanogan-Wenatchee National Forest from July 1997 to my retirement in April, 2007.
The funding for the recreation came from basically three sources: State grant programs, Recreation Fee Program, and Appropriated dollars from Congress. Though it fluctuated year by year, each of those sources accounted for about 1/3 of the recreation, trails, and wilderness budget. The Forest recreation budget peaked at about 10 million dollars and then started declining slowly after that.
The issue was that Appropriated dollars did NOT cover the fixed costs of the recreation program. If I remember correctly from one of my economics classes that means the organization is bankrupt and should close it doors.
The state grant programs were competitive grant applications and the Forest invested quite a bit of time and energy to make sure we could compete in those programs and that we would be the model agency for grant program applications.
The Recreation Fee Program was at that time supposed to be experimental, but opportunities to change the program were very limited and in many cases defeated by recreation groups that did not want to pay for their recreation programs.
What to do???
The Federal land management agencies need a steady funding source that can be used for operations and maintenance funding outside the Congressional funding process.
The first really successful Federal recreation funding program was the Duck Stamp program and Pittman-Robertson 10-11% tax on hunting and fishing products to fund state wildlife programs.
There are other funding sources following this line of thinking.
There is need to develop Federal grant recreation programs similar to the State of Washington’s refund of gas taxes paid when the gas was used on “non-public roads” (it really means non-gas tax funded public roads) to fund recreation programs on local, state, and federal lands.
This is similar to the Federal Recreation Trails Program (RTP) Funded by gas taxes paid by off-road vehicles, the Recreational Trails Program (RTP) is dedicated to the construction, restoration and maintenance of nonmotorized and motorized recreational trails (paved and unpaved) and trail-related facilities.
EXCEPT, the state of Washington program includes ALL sources of gasoline, not just that burned by ORV’s like the Federal program. Expansion of the Federal program to all gasoline burned on non-gas tax supported roads would be a significant source of recreation funding for ALL Federal land management agencies.
Right now, gas taxes paid by recreationists using Federal lands are DIVERTED to state and Federal highway programs. The issue of fairness is a strong argument for diverting these funds to the agencies that manage the impacts of recreation users on the Federal lands. The other advantage is that the tax would be directly linked to inflation increases in the Federal gas tax.
I briefly looked at which agency would be benefit the most and it would be the National Park Service. But the funding increase would be most impressive for agencies like Forest Service and BLM. The recreation funds could be focused on operation and maintenance costs of existing facilities.
Likewise, years ago hunters and fishers put a 10% plus tax on fishing and hunting equipment to fund fish and wildlife projects. The program has been wildly successful for saving our fish and wildlife resources.
The same can be done by shaming the outdoor product companies that are dependent on public lands for their wealth, but refuse to even consider help funding the public lands that created their wealth. We are talking serious money. Yvon Chouinard, founder of Patagonia is a BILLIONAIRE to his chagrin. One of only 900 in the United States. We can help him with his guilt trip by helping the Patagonia nonprofit fund recreation services on public lands.
There could be other programs that would fit under this heading.
There are serious issues with agencies lobbying Congress and the Forest Service, BLM, and other Federal agencies need to develop OUTSIDE LOBBYING groups to lobby on behalf of the agencies. American Forests, the Boone and Crockett Club did this in past decades.
I don’t see today. It needs to happen again.
There is other legislation that can be “tweaked” to shift funds to the land management agencies as well.
Agency Special Use Fees.
Congress has over the years allowed the Forest Service to retain fees to be used in management of the National Forests.
The agencies really should do a review of these authorities and how they could be used to fund recreation opportunities.
The OKA-WEN had a problem with the state of Washington and the snowmobile program. To change the funding I had to rewrite and get approval for a new MOU with Washington State Parks. And they were not too excited about diverting snowmobile funding from them to the Forest Service for management of the snowmobile program. At that point, we started looking at putting them under a Special Use Permit. That would provide monies for funding Forest Service oversight of the snowmobile program. I did retire before jumping into that rabbit hole.
There is a need to look at all Forest Service permit programs and take a look at what it would take to adequately fund oversight of these programs.
Recreation Fee Program.
The Recreation Fee Program is a disjointed mess.
Special attention needs to be paid to REC.GOV. That program needs some serious reform. As expensive as the National Park Service fee program is to the American people. It is at least coherent and accepted by the public.
The other land management agencies need to look at the Recreation Fee program to simplify and make it more effective.
Appropriated Dollars
Congress likes building “monuments” to itself. It doesn’t like using taxpayer monies to maintain the monuments.
It might be more effective for the agencies to focus using recreation fee programs, special use fees, and special tax on recreation and the proposed redirect of Federal gas tax revenues to fund recreation operations and maintenance programs
Congress can then focus on building “monuments”.
Conclusion
I thought I could write a “short” article on this topic and it quickly got away from me.
But to summarize, the land management agencies need to review all state and Federal grant programs related to recreation. There are many out there. Some can be rewritten to make them more effective and extend them to recreation funding.
The Special Use Permit fees are another program area that should be reviewed.
The Recreation Fee program is a mess. It needs to be made simpler and more efficient.
The Forest Service lost its “special relationship” with Congress in the late 1970’s and the agency has not recovered. Congress likes funding “monuments” the land management agencies should insist on stable funding sources for operations and maintenance.
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Vladimir Steblina graduated from UC Berkeley with a BS degree in Forestry in 1972. His first professional job was with a forestry and engineering Consulting firm based in Oakland, California. After than I worked for the National Park Service, BLM and Forest Service and finally retired as the Recreation, Wilderness, and Trails Program Manager for the Okanogan/Wenatchee National Forests in 2007.
Here are some of the highlights of his career, in his own words.
Career highlights from my perspective included as project manager for mapping and inventory of ALL the Giant Sequoia’s south of the Mineral King road for HJW consulting firm. That also included a couple of timber growth studies and other projects such as timber sales.
For the NPS I developed and prepared a Recreational Carrying Capacity study for the Lake Mohave part of Lake Mead NRA with Mike Harvey. The study focused on the resolving conflicts between various users primarily water skiers and houseboaters.
For the Forest Service I wrote the St. Joe Wild and Scenic River Plan. Then there was about 15 wasted years in Forest Planning as economist and analyst doing ForPlan runs and other wasted analysis.
I am really proud of laying out and building Huckleberry Flat Campground for BLM. The BLM and Federal Highway came to agreement dumping waste material into Huckleberry Flat before I got there. I worked Federal Highways to ballast the road and put funny little spurs off the main road. Thanks to them the public got a “free” campground.
My career was split between recreation and timber analysis, but my heart was always with recreation management, but timber paid the bills for a long time.
Wouldn’t it be great to have a map like this for the Keystone projects? Linked to accomplishment reports.
Some of us have been wondering “how does it work exactly (who does what?) when grantees (such as the Keystones) do projects?” So many thanks to our friends at AFRC for their February newsletter, in which they tell us more details of how this works.
The Partner Paradigm- Timber Contracting in the Golden State
The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (BIL), and Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) provided hundreds of millions of dollars to the U.S. Forest Service (USFS) and selected ‘Keystone Partners’ to address the wildfire crisis in California. The size and scope of these Keystone Master Stewardship Agreements
(MSA) is unique. and have created opportunities for a few of our National Forests. These Forests have capitalized on an additional workforce as well as implementation funding to increase the number of acres treated. These agreements allow for the partners to act as an extension of the USFS in many stages of project design, preparation, contracting, and administration.
Background. The USFS is undergoing its most significant operational shift in decades. Facing a mandate to treat millions of acres and a historic infusion of federal cash, the agency is increasingly delegating forest management to non-profit partners. The shift is driven by a stark reality: the scale of the wildfire
crisis is beyond what the agency can address alone. In response, the USFS established a “Shared Stewardship” strategy with the goal of treating one million acres annually by 2025.
In California, the Tahoe National Forest (TNF) has become a primary staging ground, with projects like the North Yuba Landscape Resilience Project receiving approximately $160 million to treat 275,000 acres. The TNF and the National Forest Foundation (NFF) entered a 20-year Keystone Agreement with the intention of executing priority projects quickly and efficiently.
NFF began their work in 2023 and have been successful in preparing and implementing fuels reduction work across thousands of acres of the Forest. These projects were packaged and advertised to forestry consultants, contractors, and sawmills. Project preparation was completed by NFF employees and
multiple California consultants. Projects were advertised to interested parties as ‘service work’ contracts and were paid on a per acre basis. Forest products were advertised on a ‘delivered log’ rate, with delivery of logs included as a service work item in the awarded contractor’s service contract. The ‘NFF Tahoe
Pilot Model’ has not been without the expected, and unexpected, issues that arise when a new model is introduced. At the base of these issues was NFF’s lack of experience in their acting role of contracting officer, timber management officer, and sale administrator.
Conceivably, if NFF is trained up to do those jobs… is the FS paying for two parallel organizations on the same acres? And the FS is paying to train up non-permanent people..is that a good investment? I am a fan of all the Keystone partners, but I think the questions need to be asked. And I continue to think that the FS should make public the annual reports (at least) so folks can see where the funding is going and what is being accomplished (I had to FOIA to get them).
These were not skill sets that NFF could bring to the table when given the authorities in their agreement.
Moving Forward. To resolve these issues, AFRC has worked with our membership, the Tahoe National Forest, and National Forest Foundation. Standards are being developed through extensive discussion, a framework of expectations, and protocols. Monthly meetings will continue to occur to ensure that all
parties have clarity on NFF offerings from the TNF’s projects. The NFF staff have created a ‘contract and communications plan’ that provides a detailed outline of the organization’s expectations and policies. This plan looks to ensure that issues with the timing of deliveries, log quality, and quantity are addressed on a weekly basis. A work in progress and a movement in the direction our members need to be successful.
Future items to address include:
• BIL and IRA funding being obligated prior to the end of 2028 rather than 2032.
• The Plumas National Forest adopting and implementing the NFF Tahoe standards.
• Allocation and use of retained receipts between the National Forests and their Partners.
• Contract content, authorities and administration.
This partner paradigm aims to accelerate forest restoration and allow for greater flexibility and creativity to implement treatments. As the USFS continues to shift its authorities and responsibilities to its partners, AFRC will continue to engage with USFS and its partners in California to ensure our industries needs and concerns are addressed.
It’s interesting that some folks are worried about partnering with States giving “State control.” But folks are not worried about partnering with NGOs giving “NGO control.” I’m not worried about either, but more transparency about all kinds of partners and the joint work can’t hurt.
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Next post will be on the NEPA approach of the North Yuba Landscape Resilience Project. There seems to be much innovative NEPA work in the Sierra Nevada area.. there is the SERAL project on the Stanislaus, the two-forest prescribed fire EA on the Sierra and Sequoia. So shout out to all those innovators!
I’m posting this because while onshore and offshore wind have different technologies, costs and impacts, concerns of industrialization of landscapes are consistent. I’ve noticed much reporting on “Trump’s War on Wind”, which tends to make invisible (non-Trump) people’s concerns with the technology and preference for other choices for energy production. People with concerns have also been maligned as tools of the O&G industry or closet Trumpians or whatever. Robert Bryce keeps a database of rejections and restrictions on wind, solar and batteries from around the world, for those of you who are interested.
In the West, onshore wind tends to located far from cities which also require building sometimes extensive transmission as well. And you might remember the December 24 post-election approval of the Lava Ridge project by the Biden Admin (opposed by the Governor of Idaho).
According to Wikipedia:
Most of the project’s power will be exported through the already approved Southwest Intertie Project (SWIP), also being developed by LS Power, which runs south to Las Vegas and Southern California.[1]
Western onshore can have the “green colonialism” vibe (from Governor Little’s letter “to give California electricity from Idaho), as well as tension with “protection” of federal lands. that may not exist for coastal offshore, which is located close to dense energy-using communities.
Anyway, yesterday I received an interesting press release (for those of you who follow the political angle, Governor Sherrill is a D.) She seems to be doubling down on solar plus batteries, nuclear and gas and not so much wind. Perhaps the tide (so to speak) is turning?
I’m reposting the full press release from Save LBI below.
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Save LBI Encouraged by Governor Sherrill’s Energy Approach as a Responsible Alternative to Costly and Damaging Offshore Wind.
Long Beach Township, NJ, February 10, 2026 – Save LBI Inc., which has long opposed New Jersey’s risky and expensive offshore wind buildout, supports Governor Mikie Sherrill’s Executive Order No. 2 declaring an electricity affordability emergency and directing a shift toward solar and advanced nuclear production, modernized natural gas plants, and policies that reduce peak electricity demand, and provides suggestions to foster that approach.
“For years, we have warned that overreliance on offshore wind would drive up electric bills, threaten grid reliability, impair our onshore military radars, harm marine life and industrialize our coastal waters with only minimal and uncertain benefit,” said Bob Stern , a Ph.D. scientist and president of Save LBI. “The new order appears to recognize the many failings of offshore wind as it pivots to energy sources that are less costly and more reliable”.
A Practical, Consumer Focused Path Forward
The Executive Order correctly identifies the core of the crisis: rapidly rising demand (driven in part by data centers and “ghost load” colliding with a shortage of dependable supply in the Pennsylvania-New Jersey-Maryland (PJM) wholesale electricity market. Capacity prices have exploded, adding billions in new costs to New Jersey families and businesses. We commend the Governor for:
· Accelerating distributed and utility-scale solar. By fast-tracking distributed and utility-scale generation projects, the State is making the right moves toward local, modular resources that can be built in short time frames.
· Modernizing existing natural gas plants instead of forcing premature retirements. Directing the NJ Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) to expedite permits for efficiency upgrades and capacity improvements acknowledges that modern, more efficient gas plants remain essential to keeping the lights on and prices in check.
· Recentering nuclear power as a backbone of reliability. Creating a Nuclear Power Task Force to pursue advanced nuclear generation is a critical step toward a long-term, zero emission, and almost always on resource that does not depend on weather or volatile commodity prices.
· Cutting red tape and fixing interconnection bottlenecks. The Order’s focus on faster, more predictable permitting and improved interconnection processes will remove some of the key obstacles that have stalled responsible energy projects.
Additional Steps for New Jersey To Consider
To maximize the benefits of this new approach to electric energy and further protect consumers and the power grid, Save LBI is offering a number of suggestions for the State to consider :
· Have the NJ Board of Public Utilities (BPU) proceed with an advanced nuclear solicitation process to select specific projects in parallel with, and informed by the Nuclear Task Force work, and consider as one selection factor the co-location of new facilities with AI data centers and industrial or energy production facilities such as at Oyster Creek where Holtec International is proposing to build four Small Modular Reactors (SMRs).
· Explore opportunities for new natural gas generation capacity, especially those that would make efficient use of the new Northeast Supply Enhancement (NESE) gas supply system.
· Review the DEP’s reasons for the disapproval of the Competitive Power Ventures Keasbey Energy Center natural gas electric generation project and whether the sponsor is still interested in pursuing that project.
· Prioritize utility-scale solar; require that BPU issue awards sooner than the 270-day review period in the Executive Order so facilities can be placed in service prior to December 31, 2027 and receive federal tax credits.
· Implement aggressive demand-side energy management and efficiency standards.
· Revise pricing practices to require AI data centers and other very large electricity users pay the full cost of the added supply of electricity they demand.
· Provide training and educational programs on skills important to nuclear and natural gas generation projects.
· Review New Jersey‘s environmental justice law and rules as regards the siting of electric generation facilities; it is unclear why more stringent air quality standards and procedures should be applied to communities based on income or minority status, as opposed to existing pollution levels wherever those occur.
· Modify the current requirement in the State Energy Master Plan that all electricity sold in New Jersey by January 1, 2035 come from clean energy sources. The requirement is unrealistic and contrary to the reliability and affordability goals of the Executive Order. It has distorted sound energy source planning, which has been and will always be a balancing of source affordability, reliability, longevity, and environmental impact. Additionally, it should be clear by now that no electric energy source is environmentally “clean.”
· Codify a new renewable energy generation solicitation policy that places a moratorium on offshore wind generation and related transmission projects, and requires, prior to any future State awards, a full, independent and transparent cost-benefit, reliability, and environmental review that is benchmarked against advanced nuclear, solar, natural gas and energy efficiency alternatives.
· Withdraw from the State Agreement Approach under which NJ requested that PJM design a customized transmission “backbone” specifically for offshore wind. This unprecedented request from NJ forced PJM to divert engineering resources away from standard project queue work.
Conclusion
“Executive Order No. 2 is an important course correction for New Jersey’s energy policy,” Stern concluded. “It squarely addresses the affordability and reliability crisis, emphasizes distributed and dispatchable resources, and accepts advanced nuclear and modernized gas as essential pillars of a balanced system. This is a far more responsible and sustainable path than doubling down on costly, environmentally damaging and uncertain offshore wind projects.”
At the same time, additional work is needed. Save LBI looks forward to working with the Administration, the BPU, the Legislature, and local communities to implement the new energy plan, and strengthen it with realistic policies and additional measures to ensure New Jersey residents have access to reliable, affordable, and environmentally responsible energy for decades to come. Save LBI recently formed a sister organization, Save LBI Advocacy, that will be engaged in legislative affairs.
A trash pile surrounded by barbed wire to keep bears out sits at an illegal cannabis site in the Shasta-Trinity National Forest on Nov. 12, 2025. Photo by Fred Greaves for CalMatters
We find more and more things that could benefit from the People’s Database.. how about number of grows found and cleaned up by District by year? Then reporters wouldn’t have to do FOIA requests.. if the data is even available.’
Now, they’re sounding another alarm — that inadequate federal funding, disjointed communication, dangerous conditions and agencies stretched thin at both the state and federal level are leaving thousands of grow sites – and their trash, pesticides, fertilizers and more – to foul California’s forests.
Wengert has tallied nearly 7,000 abandoned sites like this one on California’s public lands. It’s almost certainly an underestimate, she said. Her team knows of only 587 that have been at least partly cleaned up.
No government agency can provide a comprehensive count; several referred CalMatters back to Wengert’s nonprofit for an unofficial tally.
Most of the sites Wengert’s team identified are in national forests, where “limited funding and a shortage of personnel trained to safely identify and remove hazardous materials” is driving a backlog in clean ups, a U.S. Forest Service spokesperson told CalMatters via an unsigned email.
The federal government, the spokesperson said, has dedicated no funding for the forest service to clean them up. And it’s leaving a mess in California.
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The federal government owns nearly half of the more than 100 million acres in California. But it’s California’s agencies and lawmakers taking the lead on tackling the environmental harms of illegal grows — even as the problem sprawls across state, federal and privately managed lands.
The California Department of Fish and Wildlife’s policy is to clean up all grows spotted on its 1.1 million acres of wildlife areas, ecological reserves, and other properties, officials say.
Staff assist with clean ups on federal lands “when asked,” said cannabis program director Amelia Wright — typically on California’s dime. But, she said, “That’s not our mandate.”
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Where the State gets the bucks…
Fees and taxes on California’s legalized cannabis market fuel state efforts — supporting the California Department of Fish and Wildlife’s cannabis program and funding tens of millions of dollars in grants for rehabilitating places damaged by cultivation. These grants can cover clean-ups and sustainable cultivation projects, or even related efforts like fish conservation.
The department has helped remove almost 350,000 pounds of trash and more than 920 pesticide containers from grows on public lands over nearly a decade.
Maybe there should be a federal tax on legal cannabis in states that have large amounts of federal land? Of course, legal is not really the problem, is it? Is it fair for legal cannabis to pay for remediating illegal grows?
In 2024, lawmakers passed Wood’s bill directing the Fish and Wildlife department to conduct a study to inform a statewide cleanup strategy for cannabis grows. The law requires the department to provide regular reports to the legislature about illegal cultivation and restoration efforts on lands both public and private.
To Wright, that’s a path forward, however prospective it may be.
“It just feels like such redemption right now for many of us,” Wright said. “It’s a one of a kind program. So we didn’t have a playbook — we’re still creating it.”
But the study, which Wengert’s organization is conducting on the state’s behalf, isn’t due until next year. Meanwhile, the bloom of illicit pot grows on private land has been demanding California’s attention, a growing problem since voters legalized cannabis in 2016.
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The California Department of Justice told CalMatters it recently identified a “substantial increase of illicit cannabis cultivations on or adjacent to public lands.” Of the 605 sites where a multi-agency state and federal task force ripped out illicit cannabis plants, roughly 9% were on public lands — up from an average of 3 to 4%.
“Everybody thought with legalization that a lot of these problems would go away,” said Wood, the former assemblymember.
But, he added, the sites remain. “It’s a ticking environmental time bomb.”
And the contamination, new research confirms, lingers.
Apparently, the FS doesn’t get funding to clean up sites, but is investigating how the sites impact wildlife.
Please don’t push the red shiny buttons, or lick the big pink things,” Gabriel joked at the mouth of a well-worn path growers had carved into the woods. (Carbofuran, a dangerous and illegal pesticide often found on grow sites, is bright pink.)
The team, Gabriel explained, wasn’t there to clean up the grow. They didn’t have the money for that. Instead, he said, shouldering his backpack and strapping on a first aid kit, they were there to document the contaminants as part of a U.S. Forest Service-funded investigation into wildlife around cultivation sites.
“This site will sit on this landscape until someone acquires some level of funding,” Gabriel said. “And no one can really push it, until we actually get that data.”
We were allowed to use carbofuran on seed orchards in the 80’s.. it is really bad stuff.
In 2018, a federal audit lambasted the U.S. Forest Service for failing to clean up — or even document — trespass grows in national forests.
The agency was finding and eradicating cannabis grows in national forests effectively. But its failure to consistently clean them up, the audit said, put “the public, wildlife, and environment at risk of contamination” and could allow growers to return more easily.
Little has changed. From 2020 through 2024, when Gabriel worked for the agency, a spokesperson said the Forest Service “prioritized reclaiming sites over investigating active grows.”
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That seems like an odd prioritization, since LEOs are not necessarily trained nor funded to do it. I wonder whether that prioritization occurs (occurred) in other places than California? It would be great if public safety (investigating active grows) didn’t compete with clean-ups. On the other hand, perhaps enough law enforcement could reduce the total number of grows and pollution? If we knew how many there were (via the People’s Database), folks could lobby Congress for funding.
But the agency said it still has received too little funding and has too few personnel trained to work with often hazardous materials. And the backlog persists. How big it is, the Forest Service wouldn’t say. After declining an interview request and taking two months to reply to emailed inquiries, a spokesperson said CalMatters must submit a public records request.
The Forest Service now is shifting the responsibility for cleanups to individual forests. That, too, contributes to the backlog, the spokesperson said.
U.S. Rep. Jared Huffman, a California Democrat and ranking member of the House Natural Resources Committee, said he has tried repeatedly to direct more funding to cleaning up trespass grows on federal lands, but with little success in Congress.
“We have tried just about everything,” said Huffman. “It’s clearly not enough.”
Now, under the Trump administration, the Forest Service is even more understaffed. A spokesperson said while law enforcement staffing “has remained steady,” roughly 5,000 non-fire employees “have either offboarded or are in the process of doing so” through “multiple voluntary separation programs.”
Huffman put it more starkly. “They’ve been gutted,” he said. “The Forest Service right now has a sign on the door that says, ‘We’re out of the office. We’re not sure when we’ll ever be back.’”
I’m not sure that the 5000 non-fire employees (about the same that were hired in the last few years) would have made a difference if there is no funding. If there were funding, it could be contracted out to companies that are experts at cleanup.
Few organizations are qualified to do science-informed cleanups, and none work as widely as Wengert and Gabriel’s.
California’s Cannabis Restoration Grant Program is paying the team more than $5.3 million to conduct the legislatively mandated study on cleaning up grow sites, and also to train and support tribal teams and other organizations to do this work.
The study, and the training, include best practices for handling and disposing of hazardous waste, Gabriel said. More teams means more competition for the pot of state-allocated money, but he wants more allies in the fight.
Seems like another area where states and feds should work together.. but when do we worry about “state control” in cooperative efforts and when not? Only in some states and only for some kinds of projects?
Just like fuel treatments, couldn’t the states and feds agree on what to track and track it the same way? Number of grows identified, number of grows remediated, for the FS by forest, accumulated over state, private and federal lands?
I was told that this was a handout from the Supe’s Meeting.. I don’t have independent confirmation. It does sound plausible, given what Chief Schultz and others have previously said. A few things I found worthy of note.
Aggressive coordinated approach to keep fires small. I assume that this is the same approach as the new USWFS?
Positioning grazing as a core land management tool by expanding access, modernizing processes, and elevating producer voices. I’d be interested in what they mean by “expanding access.”
Supporting energy development that complements forest management I think this means “producing energy from wood waste from fuel treatments” but I don’t know.
My favorites were the first three recreation bullets.. improving trails, campgrounds and facilities and maintaining infrastructure such as roads and bridges.
I also like personalizing and expanding visitor access through on-site staff and volunteer engagement.
“Onsite engagement” I vote yes. I wrote about this in 2012 as the importance of presence, comparing the Park Service focus vs. the FS (in that case, concessionaires).
2012. I would argue with “virtual concierge services, like Recreation.gov”. It seems to me that in today’s AI age, we could do better and save the taxpayers mega-bucks by doing the concierge-ing in-house. Anyway…what strikes or surprises you? Sorry about the gaps between pages.
New lawsuit: Center for Biological Diversity v. U. S. Department of Agriculture (N.D. California)
On January 28, the Center for Biological Diversity and Sierra Club sued the USDA, Forest Service and APHIS over the Department’s July 2025 “interim final rule” establishing revised procedures for NEPA compliance. They claim the government “provided no explanation for USDA’s major changes to its longstanding public participation procedures.” The rule responded to the executive order “Unleashing American Energy,” and eliminated requirements for public participation for scoping and EISs. Plaintiffs allege this violates the APA and NEPA. They also challenge, under the APA, the lack of any opportunity for the public to participate in the rule’s development before it became effective. The article has a link to the complaint.
New lawsuit: Center for Biological Diversity v. Schultz (D. Arizona)
On February 3, the Center for Biological Diversity and the Maricopa Bird Alliance filed an Endangered Species Act lawsuit to force the Forest Service and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to reduce or eliminate cattle grazing on 122 miles of waterways in 25 grazing allotments on the Tonto National Forest. The lawsuit cites the “ongoing failure to adequately protect and conserve eight listed species and their critical habitat on the Tonto National Forest: the endangered Gila chub, spikedace, razorback sucker, and the southwestern 1 willow flycatcher (“flycatcher”); and the threatened yellow-billed cuckoo (“cuckoo”), Chiricahua leopard frog (“frog”), northern Mexican gartersnake, and narrow-headed gartersnake.” The complaint cites improper consultation with the Fish and Wildlife Service on recent allotment decisions and failure to reinitiate consultation on ongoing grazing activities, and may be found here.
Court remedy in Center for Biological Diversity v. Culver (N.D. California)
On January 23, the district court prohibited off-road vehicle use in critical habitat for desert tortoises in California’s western Mojave Desert. The court order vacated BLM’s travel management plan as it applied to the critical habitat, and the Fish and Wildlife Service’s biological opinion – the order is linked to the article. This court had previously determined the plan violated FLPMA because “BLM (1) failed to explain and demonstrate how the 2019 OHV Route Network minimizes impacts to the desert tortoise and Lane Mountain milkvetch …, and (2) improperly relied on optional mitigation measures in addressing FLPMA’s minimization obligations.” The court had also found a violation of ESA. That decision was discussed here.
On January 27, the Utah Attorney General and two Utah counties sued the Bureau of Land Management, alleging violations of FLPMA and NEPA when it adopted the Henry Mountains and Fremont Gorge travel management plan in January, 2025. The plan is a response to a 2017 settlement agreement, and it would close 612 miles of routes to motorized use and restrict motorized access elsewhere. Another lawsuit by the BlueRibbon Coalition was discussed here.
Preliminary injunction denied in Sovereign Iñupiat for a Living Arctic v. Burgum (D. Alaska)
On January 27, the district court denied a request for a preliminary injunction in this case (discussed here) involving ConocoPhillips Alaska Incorporated’s winter seismic and exploration drilling program in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska, including within the Teshekpuk Lake Special Area. The court found that plaintiffs would be unlikely to prevail on the merits under the Naval Petroleum Reserves Production Act because “BLM conducted a reasonably thorough analysis of the impacts of the Winter Program on tundra in the project area on various types of vegetation,” and found “expected impacts to vegetation would be minor and would be further minimized through applicable mitigation measures.” The court noted “deference owed to BLM in selecting mitigation measures it deems are necessary or appropriate.”
New lawsuit: Nuiqsut Trilateral, Inc. v. Burgum (D. D.C.)
On January 28, plaintiff filed a lawsuit to stop the BLM from terminating a right-of-way agreement they had made at the end of 2024 to mitigate the effects of the Willow project, approved in 2023. One condition of that decision was mitigating the project’s effects on Teshekpuk Lake and its caribou herd. The agreement to protect about a million acres around the lake was with Nuiqsut Trilateral, a nonprofit organization comprising the city and village of Nuiqsut along with the village’s Kuukpik Corp. The BLM now says the Naval Petroleum Reserves Production Act does not authorize rights‑of‑way intended to restrict oil and gas activity, and terminated the agreement because it considers subsistence uses to be “non-use.” The complaint alleges violations of the APA and the 5th Amendment to the Constitution. The article includes links to these documents.
Amended complaint in State of Washington v. Trump (W.D. Washington)
On January 30, the 17 state plaintiffs amended their May 2025 complaint challenging President Trump’s “National Energy Emergency” to add the U.S Department of the Interior as a defendant, accusing the department of illegally bypassing requirements in the National Environmental Policy Act and Endangered Species Act when permitting fossil fuel projects. The article links to a press release that includes a link to the complaint. Colorado also joined the lawsuit, and according to the Colorado attorney general, “Congress passed the National Emergencies Act to prevent presidents from declaring national emergencies for pointless or partisan purposes — exactly what the president has done with this executive order.”
New lawsuit: Conserve Southwest Utah v. U. S. Department of the Interior (D. D.C.)
On February 4, six conservation organizations filed a complaint against the BLM decision in January to approve a four-lane, 4.5-mile highway through the Red Cliffs National Conservation Area to meet the needs of nearby St. George. This decision reversed a 2024 Biden Administration decision, which had revoked a prior decision by the first Trump Administration (part of settlement of a prior lawsuit). That revocation was reportedly made because the ROW’s potential environmental impact was ‘inconsistent’ with legal direction for management of the NCA. The current decision allegedly violates statutes specific to this area and NEPA, as well as the ESA (the Fish and Wildlife Service is also a defendant) because of effects on threatened Mojave Desert tortoises. The article includes a link to the complaint, and a map.
New lawsuit: Center for Biological Diversity v. Bureau of Land Management (C.D. California)
On February 4, The Center for Biological Diversity and the Amargosa Conservancy joined the Timbisha Shoshone Tribe in suing the BLM to stop St. Cloud Mining from drilling near Ash Meadows National Wildlife Refuge. It is also near populations of three plants protected under the Endangered Species Act — the Amargosa niterwort, Ash Meadows gumplant and spring-loving centaury. The complaint, appended to the article, alleges that BLM failed to consult with the Fish and Wildlife on a decision that may affect these plants.
New lawsuit: Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance v. Garfield County, Utah (D. Utah)
On February 5, plaintiffs filed a motion for a temporary restraining order and injunction to stop a Utah county from paving a road through the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument. While the country recently obtained control over the road through litigation under RS 2477 (which gave local governments the right to roads across federal lands in some cases), plaintiffs assert that there is a requirement to consult with the BLM, which has not been met. The article includes a link to the motion
New lawsuit: Center for Biological Diversity v. U. S. Department of Commerce (D. D.C.)
On January 28, the Center sought to compel release of records related to the Trump Administration’s proposed changes in Endangered Species Act implementing regulations. The records were requested in July and again in December after the release of the regulations in November, 2025. The regulations would make these key changes, mostly to the Section 4 listing process:
eliminate the “blanket” protections for threatened species
allow for economic and other considerations and limit the foreseeable future analysis for threatened species determinations
provide a process for excluding areas from critical habitat designations, allowing consideration of economic, national security and other relevant impacts
prioritize designation of critical habitat in areas actually occupied by the species
limit the scope of review in the Section 7 consultation process
Court decision in Center for Biological Diversity v. Burgum (D. D.C.)
On January 23, the district court found that two programmatic environmental assessments by the Minerals Management Service on decommissioning structures in the waters off the Gulf Coast did not need to be updated. Plaintiff sought documentation of “environmental impacts of delayed decommissioning and extensive approval of decommissioning in place” pursuant to the Administrative Procedure Act’s ability to compel “agency action unlawfully withheld or unreasonably delayed.” The court held that plaintiffs did not identify any “ongoing major Federal action that could require supplementa[l]” NEPA analysis because programmatic decisions are complete when they are adopted. This is the same reasoning applied to land management plan decisions by the Supreme Court. The court also found it to be an “impermissible programmatic challenge.” The court was not referring to agency programmatic decisions, but to plaintiffs “lumping together ‘many individual actions’ into one ‘program’ and seeking ‘wholesale correction under the APA.’ Plaintiff’s complaint may be found linked to this news release.
Court decision in State of Washington v. U. S. Department of Transportation (W.D. Washington)
On January 23, the district court reversed the Trump Administration’s abrupt stoppage of the National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (“NEVI”) Formula Program, withholding about $1 billion, to purportedly align it with the Administration’s new policies. The court said: “Such capriciousness runs counter to the Administrative Procedure Act; it is simply not how things are lawfully done.” The purpose of the program was to facilitate nationwide deployment of electric vehicle charging infrastructure and improve charging reliability for the public, and the states were following a well-define process to obtain the funds, including state plans, which were revoked. Several environmental groups intervened as plaintiffs. Among other flaws, the court reasoned the decision to withhold funds was arbitrary and capricious because:
“Time and again, Defendants assert in their motion that they “acknowledged,” “concluded” (three times), and “determined” various things prior to implementing the funding freeze. But beyond these bare assertions, they provide no evidence of such informed decision making.
The news release includes a link to the court’s order. (This might be a template for judicial review of other attempts to reverse decisions of prior administrations.)
Court decision in Environmental Defense Fund v. Wright (D. Massachusetts)
On January 30, the district court ruled that the U.S. Department of Energy violated the Federal Advisory Committee Act when it employed a group of researchers to produce a report that downplays the effects of climate change: “A Critical Review of Impacts of Greenhouse Gas Emissions on the U.S. Climate.” The five members of the group are John Christy, Judith Curry, Steven Koonin, Ross McKitrick and Roy Spencer, “scientists and researchers who question prevailing climate science and policy.” The DOE did not deny that the group had met 18 times without complying with FACA, and the court held that this violated FACA because the group provided substantive advice to the government agency. However, the court also found that DOE had now provided the relevant records, which “remedied the informational deficiency” under FACA, and denied Plaintiffs’ request to prevent the agency from using the report or keeping it online. The article includes a link to the decision.
I was going to show a range map but Little’s 1971 does not show SWP in Colorado and yet the caption to photo says “First place champion southwestern white pine in San Juan National Forest near Durango.”
Below is the Little Range Map for context:
Here’s Sam’s post:
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Santa Fe national forest Supervisor Shaun Sanchez has a lot on his plate trying to rebuild credibility after the agency’s 2022 intentional burn ignited a massive wildfire that so far as cost the taxpayers over $4 billion. Drinking water supplies in the affected communities are contaminated with toxic heavy metals likely caused by the blanket use of fire retardants. Post fire flooding resulting from increasingly intense summer thundershowers continues to erode adjacent farmland and ancient irrigation systems.
The normally bustling Santa Fe forest headquarters was mostly empty when a colleague and I visited last week. More than 80 percent of the recreation staff is gone. Around a conference table that seemed too big we discussed the weather and shared hope that this winter’s first snow would permit the burning of thousands of debris piles that have built up from years of forest clearing. However, warm winds soon melted most of the snow creating another of the seemingly endless delays.
In my more than four decades of forest activism in the Southwest, Shaun is probably the most engaging Supervisor I’ve encountered. He listens and asks good questions. He’s the first to have grown up in the unique mix of cultures in northern New Mexico. Instead of just passing through, he has a deep sense of belonging to this place.
Our meeting concerned the fate of the vulnerable white pines. It’s been more than a decade since a committee of scientists recommended that a refugia be established in the Santa Fe Municipal Watershed to protect a self-replicating population of white pines still free from the century-old white pine blister rust. Despite years of pleading nothing has been done and millions of white pines were needlessly cut, piled and burned in fuel reduction projects.
New Mexico’s intermingled population of southwestern white (Pinus strobiformis) and limber pines (Pinus flexilis) is unique. Recent research has identified high levels of resistance to blister rust from seed collected in the Lincoln, Cibola and Santa Fe national forests. After 7.5 years of experimental exposure to blister rust spores, three populations had a greater than 70% survival rates representing perhaps the highest level of resistance documented to date in a North American white pine species. Preserving this diversity is essential to white pine survival.
Ecologists in the 1920s were critical of the Forest Service when it told landowners to cut down the last American Chestnuts for their valuable wood as these majestic giants were being eliminated from the eastern forests by chestnut blight. The genetically resistant “redwoods of the east” were likely lost forever when the agency ignored this advice. In the 1960s, rust resistant western white pines were removed from the forests of Idaho and Montana when the cut was accelerated to extract their valuable timber before most of them succumbed to the pathogen. No need to repeat this sad story in the Southwest.
Instead, update the Santa Fe forest plan to keep up with the current science. It’s not big step — both New Mexico’s Cibola and Arizona’s Apache-Sitgreaves forest plans protect white pines — and the regional office (what’s left of it) wants forest plans in the Southwest to be consistent.
What will Washington say? Although white pines are not a commercial species on the Santa Fe, Trump officials will likely see any protection as a needless distraction. Uncommon courage is needed to stand up to these timber bullies.
Here’s the Santa Fe Watershed Management Plan (funded by CFLRP) and the key paragraph p. 18.
Continue to protect Southwestern white pine. During planning of restoration treatments a concern was expressed for the fate of Southwestern white pines in the municipal watershed, because populations have suffered in the West in recent years due to the exotic white pine blister rust. White pines in the municipal watershed have been reproducing successfully in spite of the threat of blister rust and thus the municipal watershed has been identified as a possible sub regional refugia for this tree species. The protection of southwestern white pines should continue to be an objective throughout long-term prescribed burning maintenance.
I suppose the word should be “refugium’ since they are speaking of a singular place. It does make me wonder how a series of refugia would be designated (by whom) and managed, since I don’t think there are forest geneticists in R-3. And technically, I don’t think two contractors are a “committee of scientists” nor are they geneticists..so.. not to get be defending disciplinary boundaries here..
Here were the other questions I had:
1. “after the agency’s 2022 intentional burn ignited a massive wildfire that so far as cost the taxpayers over $4 billion.” If this is Hermit’s Peak/Calf Canyon, I thought that Calf Canyon was started by a resurgent burn pile and Hermit’s Peak by an escaped prescribed fire, which were I guess two “intentional burns” if you want to characterize a resurgent burn pile that way.
2.
New Mexico’s intermingled population of southwestern white (Pinus strobiformis) and limber pines (Pinus flexilis) is unique. Recent research has identified high levels of resistance to blister rust from seed collected in the Lincoln, Cibola and Santa Fe national forests. After 7.5 years of experimental exposure to blister rust spores, three populations had a greater than 70% survival rates representing perhaps the highest level of resistance documented to date in a North American white pine species. Preserving this diversity is essential to white pine survival.”
The referenced genetic study was only of SWP. Here is what the study says, not three populations, but three families of of the 40 sampled.
We assess progeny arrays from 40 P. strobiformis families (1873 seedlings), originating from three populations, inoculated with C. ribicola. Subsequently, the seedlings were assessed for signs, symptoms and resulting impact in a common garden trial over a 7.5-year period to determine the types and frequency of
resistance in a portion of this species’ range. There was a high incidence of both stem symptoms and mortality in the P. strobiformis families tested, and families ranged in survival from 0 to 84.6%. Three families had >70% survival, representing perhaps the highest documented QR to date in a North American white pine species.
But the fact that SWP is relatively rare would be a reason to protect it. Not like sugar pine, WWP or even limber.
So a logical thing would be to collect cones from all the SWP and test them, then collect seed from those trees for planting. That’s what we did for sugar pine, western white pine, and whitebark.
Here’s a link to everything you might want to know about SWP from the fire effects information, including fire ecology.
3. “Ecologists in the 1920s were critical of the Forest Service when it told landowners to cut down the last American Chestnuts for their valuable wood as these majestic giants were being eliminated from the eastern forests by chestnut blight.The genetically resistant “redwoods of the east” were likely lost forever when the agency ignored this advice.” I asked Sam for a citation for this, as I had never heard it. Many Weeks Act eastern forests had been cut over by logging companies, e.g. the Monongahela. Also, I’m also not sure that there was an ecological science per se in the 1920’s.
4. “In the 1960s, rust resistant western white pines were removed from the forests of Idaho and Montana when the cut was accelerated to extract their valuable timber before most of them succumbed to the pathogen.” Again, there’s a great deal more to this story according to this 1999 GTR “White pine in the American West a Vanishing Species”..
Starting in 1880, the farreaching western white pine forests became the principal target for logging. The Inland Northwest’s first timber mill was built in 1880, and the second followed in 1882. Logging removed massive white pine groves for more than 100 years. After the 1910 fire episodes and the onset of logging, the young trees then fell victim to yet another challenge: white pine blister rust, an Asian fungus introduced to western North America in 1921 by way of Europe.
Probably some of you remember people who had gotten their start in the FS with Ribes eradication.
This was what the authors saw happening in 1999..
On Federal lands, harvest rates that create openings seem headed for such low levels that it appears questionable whether significant white pine restoration can take place. Without some sort of disturbances that create openings, forest succession will lead to the replacement of white pine by other species.
5. Trump? “timber bullies” on the Santa Fe?
It would be helpful to know what the SF is not doing (more at the prescription level), that the other forests are doing to protect SWP. And maybe someone has a more up-to-date range map?
I hate to be overly repetitive, but it seems like travel management is another example of where a Peoples’ Database would be helpful. We all weigh in from our own local experiences. For example, Mike commented “my experience most of the road closures that do occur are not a result of wildlife or other resource concerns, but a result of landowners, utility companies, and permittees.”
The Rio Grande’s neighbor to the west, the San Juan, had a travel management decision that seemed to be litigated either way they made the decision (that;s how it reached the RO).. the the TM decision from heck. And it was not about landowners or utility companies or permittees. But perhaps those are the intractable problems that just seem common because they are most noticeable? In my experience, new roads tended to be by landowners for access. And closures of FS roads at the request of landowners or others would seemingly require some kind of documentation? Perhaps outside of standard TM decisions?
In the Peoples” Database, I would like to see, by year and District: miles of roads, temp or permanent, additions, closures, maintenance and remediation, by year, funding/work sources and purpose/reason. I think that would tell us a great deal, both locally and at broader scales for more detailed discussion.
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Anyway, here is the text of the One Voice/USA/ ORBA? letter to the Chief. Below are their specific concerns. I see some commonalities with what others (including retirees) have said. Note their focus on the importance of forest planning (NFMA).
A1. Repealing the TMR does not address the fact that most forest plans also require a travel planning process in their RMP. The US Forest Service had the authority to manage recreational usage before the 2005 TMR was finalized as they have broad authority to manage actions that are thought to be impacting resources negatively. Most forests we work with had plans in place to address open areas and motorized opportunities prior to the 2005 TMR being adopted.
A2. Revisions are needed to ensure that travel issues are meaningfully dealt with in a coordinated and thoughtful manner. Without basic coordination of goals and standards opportunities will be lost. Planners will never address one of our major concerns, which is when motorized trail opportunities are provided they are highly scattered across the landscape.
A3. Open riding on a landscape level will degrade opportunities and impact resources. Good planning focuses management resources. Without the ability to focus resources, the public will be provided an exceptionally poor experience as infrastructure, like parking lots, toilets, maps and other infrastructure will be difficult to provide. Maintenance of routes is critical to basic access in many areas that continue to face challenges with poor forest health. Without maintenance of these routes, access to these areas would be lost.
A4. Safety of users will degraded. We are intimately aware that all forms of recreation in the backcountry results in safety concerns. Some are preventable, such as the need to educate users of unavoidable width restrictions on trails or areas such as shelf roads/trails. Wheeled vehicles frequently get stuck on snowmobile trails as they don’t understand the opportunity provided by a groomed trail. Without basic management education of the public will be made more difficult.
B. Proposed standards and goals for a new management process to provide recreational access. Our Organizations would welcome the opportunity to work with the USFS to develop high quality recreational opportunities on forest land to fill the void currently being faced. Withdrawal of the TMR would place this type of discussion as a high priority for future administration. Future administration may have a VERY different opinion on priorities.
B1. Clearly repeal President Nixon’s Executive Order 11644/11989 as these goals conflict with federal law. Any effort to replace the TMR must include revocation of EO 3 11644 issued by President Nixon. The minimization criteria created by this EO are horribly out of date and conflict with Federal law.
B2. Adequate road and adequate trails must be prioritized as identifiable management goal. A major weaknesses of the current TMR is all decision making is local. No guidance or standards are provided for local managers other than minimizing impacts under EO 11644. As a result, local resources are commonly directed towards other resources that have standards and performance requirements.
B3. Summer and winter must remain separate planning processes. Summer and winter travel planning are entirely separate management processes to address entirely distinct management challenges. If these differences are not recognized, the public will lose open areas for winter immediately as the difference in planning process and goals is a constant point of education with new agency staff.
B4. We vigorously support the concept of “no net loss for trails and roads”. This type of standard must be applied in a new travel rule and a requirement for interim management as a new travel rule is developed. Our Organizations are all too familiar with how effective the “no net gain” standard has been on closing motorized opportunities.
B5. Road to Trail Conversions. Clear and extensive guidance on this planning process must be provided. This type of a standard has to apply to administrative routes until they were reviewed for suitability to convert to trails as mandated by existing TMR and legacy roads to trails. We are aware of a minimal number of TMP that have performed this analysis despite it being clearly required since 2005 TMR adoption.
B6. Open riding areas are highly valuable and unique opportunities that are not provided on forests at any scale. Any revisions to the 2005 TMR should stress the value of these opportunities where appropriate. Even comparatively small summer open areas simply don’t exist on USFS lands currently and these would be highly sought after opportunities on the landscape.
B7. Recreational opportunities are provided in balance with other values such as wildlife, water, grazing and other multiple uses. Balance avoids conflicts.
